AWOL
by Geu23
Summary: He was always alone. He was always hurting. He always stayed away from people. But that was okay because then he would stop hurting and fade away into the background like the ghosts that only he could see. AWOL can stand for many things. An AU Abuse Fic


**_~!WainGuy?~ here with a oneshot for you guys for Halloween! And today is my parents 17th ANNIVERSARY! Well, I hope you enjoy this story even though it hardly has anything to do with Halloween. Please forgive for messing up the other characters; it was for the story!_**

**_Disclaimer: I don't own anything but the plot._**

**_Warnings: Abuse, language, implications to sexual activities and... Ed._**

**_ps Be sure that you are in a well-lit room when reading and are comfortable when doing so._**

**_pps Please leave a review. It'll make me very very very very very very HAPPY!_**

**A.W.O.L**

_He was always alone. He was always hurting. He always stayed away from people. But that was okay because then he would stop hurting and fade away into the background… like the ghosts that only he could see._

**A W**hole** O**rigin's** L**ost

Ed stared vacantly at the two black coffins in front of him. One was tall and the other was small but both were black and they both contained his most precious people inside. He couldn't understand why they were placed into those two black boxes before they had to put dirt on it.

Why were they keeping them inside those coffins? Why were they burying them into the ground? What did they mean when they said that they were 'gone' and that 'they weren't coming back'?

The man continued to drone on about life and death; two sides of a coin, two sides of a mirror and that they were 'going to a better place'. Where was this better place anyway?

He could only watch as they lowered the coffins into the ground and then they buried them. Little by little the black box disappeared and the hole was filled. He didn't understand. Why wasn't he crying? Why did it feel so empty?

Slowly, people moved away and left. He and his father were alone, in front of two small headstones. His father looked so sad; his wrinkled face a sad frown, his golden eyes bright with unshed tears. This was just the beginning.

**A W**hole** O**ctober** L**ater

Ed stared at the mirror. He had a bruise forming on his left cheek, a black eye, a split lip and a large gash from his right shoulder to his elbow. These were all new; they stood out more than the other bruises that had turned green and yellow.

He hurt. However he couldn't do anything to help himself. His father had turned away from him, had ignored him while his step-mother, a woman named Dante, and her son, his half-brother, William beat him senseless.

He touched his swollen eye and winced, how was he going to hide this? He had school tomorrow and he couldn't miss it. The exams were just around the corner and he needed to study. He had to finish school so that he could get the hell away from this place that used to be home.

But now… it was nothing except a prison.

He felt someone on his right and he slowly looked. He gave a small sigh of relief. It was his real brother, Alphonse. Well, technically it was his ghost.

"_Brother, they hurt you again."_

He gave a small pained smile, "Yeah. They always do."

His little brother gave him a teary look, his grey eyes brimming with tears. _"It's so unfair! They shouldn't be treating you like this! You don't even have your own room!"_

Well, he had the attic to himself and there was a mattress there with a pillow and blanket. That was kindda his room.

"Well, I have the attic."

"_That's still not your room! You can't do anything except for sleep and do your homework there! You can't even personalise it. Doesn't it make you sad?"_

He looked away from his brother, "I don't feel the need to personalise this place. It's not home anymore. Not after you and mum left," he said softly, his heart clenching ever so slightly.

Two translucent arms wrapped around his waist and Alphonse said in a small voice, _"We didn't choose to leave… If anything we wanted to stay…"_

He wished he could feel his brother's arms around him and his warm body but he didn't. He could only wish but they would never happen. He looked at his dead brother, his soul still the same size as it had been all those years ago when he had died; when his life was snuffed away in the rain.

"I wish I had been with you…" he trailed off.

Alphonse was about to retort when they both heard it. There was a rap on the door and a snide voice said, "Talking to yourself again pipsqueak?"

Alphonse and Edward stared a look and with a small sad sigh the younger dead brother vanished and Ed whispered, "See ya later Al."

"Pipsqueak? You in there or did you finally die?"

"I'm still in here," he snarled angrily.

There was laughter from the other side. Ed glared at the wooden door, hating the half-brother on the other side of it. Well who knew that his father had had a son with his ex when he had run away?

Then when his wife and younger son dies he gets back together with his ex – making her his wife – and claim his bastard son as his son. What a wonderful cock-and-bull story.

And he was living in it.

**A W**ithering** O**ld** L**and

It was raining, hard. Droplets hit the ground relentlessly, thunder boomed and lightning flashed but he stood in front of them; in front of their graves. He did not want to go back to that house where his father didn't give a damn about him, where his step-mother would inflict marks with her son, where all the pain had come from.

He didn't care about them anymore. He didn't care what they thought about him, he didn't care if they were worried; he just didn't care.

They had called him crazy. They had said there was something wrong with him in the head. They had said he was weak.

But did they know him?

No.

They didn't.

Not at all.

They didn't know him like the two souls that stood beside him, their translucent hands on his shoulder.

They were here and yet they were in the ground as well.

They were buried under the wet ground yet they were standing beside him, translucent and dry.

They were real. They were really there and here beside him.

He could see them.

Others couldn't.

"_Edward, you should go home," _his mother said, her greyish-green eyes were sad.

He continued to stare at the two headstones, not caring that he'd get sick in this kind of weather.

"I don't want to… And I don't have a home anymore… There's only that house," he rasped.

"_Brother…" _Al sounded sad too.

Why was he sad?

He was free; he didn't have to face the **family **that lived in that house. But he was dead.

They were dead but he could see them. He was alive but he wished he was dead. He didn't want to live anymore.

There wasn't a reason to live anymore.

**A W**icked** O**ld** L**ady

A hand gripped his shirt, pulling him off the ground. A sneering face came into his blurred vision before a rock-hard fist hit his chin. His head was forced to the side, pain blossoming and blood filling his mouth.

"This is what you get when you mess around with us you filthy bastard," the teen snarled.

What the heck did he even do to these guys?

Another punch to the gut and he doubled over, the air leaving him in a rush. He choked on his blood and an elbow rammed into his ribs before a well-aimed kick hit him on his lower back. He couldn't breathe, he could barely see and yet somehow he was still moving.

He tried to hit back but none ever struck anything. No one would hear him, no one would care… If anything the world would be a better place without him.

Then he was on the floor, his battered body hurt, his ribcage shuddered as he tried to get enough air into his body.

Without warning a foot crashed down onto his ribs. He cried out, blood gushing up his throat and onto the floor.

"Lookie 'ere Jeff! Little Eddie's coughing up blood onto th' floor!"

Others laughed and then the pressure increased causing his ribs to scream with pain. What did he do?

"You's best be wonderin' what 'cha did ta us now don' 'cha blond bitch?"

What the shit was this guy talking about?

"Wells this ol' lady tol' us to jump ya then we'd get a load of cash. The worse ya look the more money we'd get so…"

There was a pause and Ed dreaded what was coming.

"We's gotta do lots of bad thing's to ya. So boys, le's have some fun."

_A few hours later…_

He stumbled in the rain. He felt hurt; he felt every little ache from his abused body and worse of all he felt dirty. He had been violated, his thighs were sticky, his insides felt torn and his throat was sore.

He felt so filthy. Hands had touched him in forbidden places, lips had bit and licked his skin and… then they had done **that**. It was just so filthy…

How could human beings do this to another person? Were they all such vile savages like **them**?

He continued to stumble along the familiar but terribly hated road, the one that led him to that house. The house came into view; the one that contained a father that didn't care, a step-mother and half-brother that abused and hated him with every fibre of their bodies.

He entered the house quietly and was about to quietly make his way towards the bathroom when he heard **her** vile voice.

"Oh, they did you this bad?"

He looked at her as she did him with a sneer on her ugly face. How his father had fallen for her last time was a fucking mystery!

She looked away for a moment before her purple eyes returned to him. "I guess they'll get a little bit more than I had offered then."

Ed felt anger – so much rage – bubble up inside of him. She had hired them to do **that **to him? What a fucking bitch!

He wanted to rave and yell, to demand and rant but his throat was not co-operating with him so he settled for a glare.

She laughed at him, her high pitched voice grating against his nerves. Then she strode forward and lashed out. The sound of breaking glass was lost against the loud roar of thunder.

Pain scorched his eye and he clutched his face. Dante positively cackled, her manicured hands holding a broken beer bottle. "They should have done this to you," she shrieked, purple eyes wide with madness, "they should have done this to you much, much worse! He shouldn't have left me for that whore that was your mother!"

He turned away and ran out the door; he did not want to hear this. But her shrieking high-pitched voice was still heard over the rain. "HE SHOULD HAVE STAYED WITH ME! HE SHOULDN'T HAVE HAD YOU AND THAT WHORE! HE ONLY NEEDED ME AND MY SON!"

He didn't want to go back. He didn't want to go back to that hell-hole that was **their** house; he wanted it to all go away! Why was he even alive when he was just ignored and abused?

Why didn't he just die?

Why couldn't he just die!

Was he that awful that he had to live through all the pain and torture?

Was he that horrible?

His knees crashed onto the soggy ground and he pounded it with his fists. He cried in front of his loved one's graves, begging for them to come and get him. Begging for anyone to take his life away so that he didn't have to go through any more pain, so that he could finally rest.

Did he deserve this? He thought as he choked on his tears.

Was he so terrible that he couldn't even be spared any peace?

_WHY COULDN'T HE JUST DIE?_

**A**ffection** W**ith** O**ut** L**ove

He stared at Hohemheim. What? He was going to get married? And to the Mayor's daughter?

"I'm getting married to whom?" Ed asked. He just couldn't believe his ears.

Hohemheim nodded, with little emotion on his face. "To Winry Rockbell. She's your age and that's about it."

He was only twenty and his father wanted him to get married to a woman he didn't even know? How fucked up was that?

"Why am I getting married to her? I don't even know her."

Hohemheim fixed him with a stern stare. "Because I said so. You don't have a choice in this so stop asking questions."

Ed crumbled into the chair, his face in his hands. Why should he? He didn't feel obliged to listen to Hohemheim; the man had been ignoring him ever since he was nine-years old. He had only taken care of his other family.

He didn't have a choice. He never had one to begin with.

_A few years after the wedding…_

Ed was married. He had a wife, he had a lovely house, he had four lovely children and yet he was suffering. There was nothing wrong with the house or the kids; he loved them too much to think they were causing him pain. He was suffering because of his wife.

Sure, she had been nice the first few weeks – two weeks only actually – before she had started to show her true, ugly side. She was a monster.

She expected him to stay home all the time (which meant he couldn't do his job), he had to do all the work around the house since she was **working **and he had to pleasure her whenever she demanded it.

She was a monstrous bitch like that woman Dante. Except he didn't see Dante anymore and that he saw the she-devil every day.

He looked at his study. It hadn't been touched for a long time and a layer of dust covered the books and the table. All the books were neatly stacked into proper shelves; this was his work. He studied the ancient ruins and sites but he could no more ever since he had his first child, Demitri Elric.

Then she had gotten a lot nastier demanding he quit so that he could take care of her child while she worked. After Demitri had his second birthday did the she-devil wanted another child.

But instead of having one – like she wanted – she had three. Triplets, three more babies, three more mouths to feed, three more pains in her back. Two healthy boys and a little lovely girl.

She had raved and ranted at him, cursing him and his seed for making her like that. But it wasn't his fault entirely. It was hers as well; she was the one that had two eggs at the same time!

So they had two identical boys and a little girl.

And she had cursed the two boys, said that she had wanted the little girl all to herself and had told him to name the other two boys. The little girl was named Roza. He had named the boys Lucas and Leon.

They were all in their teens now. Demitri was seventeen while Lucas, Leon and Roza were fifteen. They were all smart and beautiful children. They were his children but the she-devil had said that they weren't his because he hadn't carried them around for nine months like she had.

Well he couldn't. He was a **man** after all.

"Dad."

He looked over his shoulder and saw his oldest son at the door. He was almost as tall as him with light brown hair and greenish-blue eyes. Demitri looked a lot like his grandmother actually.

"Yes, what is it?"

"Do you see ghosts?"

He blinked, now where had that question come from? His children all knew that he couldn't see much with his right eye so how was it that that kind of question had popped out?

He chuckled, "Now where did that question come from son?"

Demitri looked at him, his eyes studying him. "I see them also."

Ed stopped laughing and looked at his son seriously. He knew that his first son had been very sensitive – like he had been before their deaths – ever since he was small.

"Really now?"

Demitri nodded.

"What makes you say that?"

He looked around before he looked at him dead in the eyes. "I saw you talking to two of them."

Ed didn't respond because he didn't know how to. His own son had seen him talk to his mother and his baby brother? He hadn't seen them since last month…

"You were talking to a young boy and a woman. Who are they dad?"

Ed looked away and swallowed a few times. "They're supposed to be your grandmother and your uncle."

Demitri was silent. "How did they…?"

"They died because they were ill."

Demitri looked at his dad before he slowly walked forward and gave him a hug. His dad was hurting and he was too but his dad was worse. His dad was hurting because of his mother.

Ed hugged his son back, his chest feeling a bit tight with emotion. He had never told anyone that he could see them but now his own son had seen him interact with them, his own son could see ghosts.

"Does it frighten you that you can see ghosts?"

The seventeen year old nodded. "It's difficult to handle sometimes."

"I know it is. But you mustn't tell anyone alright?"

His dear boy nodded. Everything was going to be alright. He was here and he would always be here for his children.

**A**fter** W**ar** O**ver** L**aunches

He clutched his eyes, pain of unimaginable magnitude coursed throughout his body as blood poured out of his wounds. It had gone too far this time. The abuse had gone too far.

Winry had gone too far.

She had slapped his across the cheek with her hands and her gloves, had scratched him with her nails, had whacked him with her tools of creation, had slashed him with the kitchen knives but worse of all she had slashed a broken glass bottle across his face.

She was yelling and shrieking, cursing and screaming. He had done nothing wrong this time. It was her who had done it and yet he was the one that hurt. He couldn't see, too much blood was clogging his vision.

What was going on? Why had she done it?

Because she had cheated. She had slept with another man and had got herself pregnant and yet she was blaming him? Because he had not done enough? Because he was worthless?

What was he going to do now? What would happen if she continued this kind of torture?

Then there was banging on the door and a voice yelling to open the door and then the she-devil acted up again, screaming and yelling that it was his entire fault. Then there was a loud crash and then there was the clicking of something – a gun perhaps? – and then a booming voice.

There were too many sounds and he couldn't distinguish one from the other. Clicking glass, rage-filled screams, calm voices explaining something, thudding feet, the rubbing of cloth and then he felt a hand on his shoulder.

"We've got you," a deep voice said, "we're going to bring you to the hospital where they'll tend to you injuries Mr Elric."

**A**bused** W**ithered** O**ld** L**ad

He couldn't see anymore. The she-devil had damaged them to ruin. Now his eye sockets were sewn shut. He could no longer see his children, his friends or his beloved mother and little brother.

He could only hear and feel them if they were around. His hearing had increased; his sense of touch was extra-ordinary, even his sense of smell had improved.

But now he couldn't even see… He couldn't see the sky anymore, he couldn't see anything. He couldn't even see his grandchildren which were coming to visit him today.

He was placed into a senior home that was run by a man named Alex Armstrong. He never saw the man but he was tall, had a lot of muscles and had a lock of hair on his head with a moustache. He was told that the man had blonde hair and blue eyes.

That man was truly proud of his heritage.

There was a knock on the door and he turned away from the bookshelf. "Come in."

The door creaked open and a familiar voice greeted, "Hello dad."

He gave a smile. "Welcome Lucas."

Lucas gave a chuckle and said, "Well, the whole family's here to see you."

"Hey Dad, miss me?" Roza said, a grin could be heard in her voice.

"Miss you? Why would I miss you when you're always on the radio and on tv?"

"Because I'm your daughter!" she said with a laugh.

"Shove off Roza, you aren't that popular!" Leon exclaimed.

"Take it easy brothers and sisters," Demitri said, ever the wise sagely one among his siblings.

"Demitri! Good to see you brother!" Roza exclaimed.

Demitri laughed. "We're here to visit dad, remember?"

"Oh yeah! Hi dad!"

Ed could only chuckle. These were his children and he loved all of them with all of his heart.

**A W**elcome** O**f** L**ove

His family had grown. From four children he had eight grandchildren and his daughter had promised him that there were more to come. Well, it was good to know that they were all living good lives.

He was so tired. He slipped back into his bed and sank into the warmth of sleep for the last time because the next time he woke up he could see again and he was in a field of grass.

Where was he? Was this a dream?

"It isn't a dream brother."

Ed froze before he turned around and there stood his baby brother, Alphonse.

"Alphonse?"

He looked like he was about to cry and yet he smiled. "You can finally stay with us. Welcome home brother."

He blinked. He could stay with Alphonse now? Did that mean he was dead?

"Edward," a voice called from behind him. Mum!

He whirled around and there stood his mother in all her beauty. He was home. He was back with his mother and his little brother.

He didn't hurt anymore.

He was okay.

He was dead.

But it was okay.

He was finally back home.


End file.
